Blood sugar
by niewypowiedziane
Summary: Tony is diabetic and no, it's not a secret. (But he honestly loves those green tea Kit Kats, too.)


'Thanks for the help, J,' Tony mutters as the suit gets closer to the tower; the Avengers are half a minute behind him in a Quinjet. 'That was so damn long, I don't know why those things kept multiplying, I thought that was never gonna end.'

'I know, sir. Their replication rate was unseen. At least they died easily.'

'Yeah, otherwise the world would be infested with gigantic alien bugs by now,' Tony sighs, letting JARVIS unwrap the suit from his body and when the last pieces are removed, he Tony suddenly finds himself without any support and staggers.

His head is swimming and his hands are shaking and it can either mean he has internal bleeding or brain injury or the usual.

'J, send Dummy up here with something for me,' Tony mutters, making his way to the nearest armchair slowly. This shouldn't happen since he's sticking to his daily plan but no one could foresee fighting those damn monsters for fourteen hours straight without a possibility of a break – they were multiplying, dammit – and the suits are not fitted with enough supplies for that kind of event.

Tony already had JARVIS made corrections for that even if it might be difficult; storing more fluids inside will compromise the careful balance that makes suit so genius. It seems to be the time for a new design. Maybe a new name, too, why not – Tony suddenly finds himself wondering why hasn't he changed the suit's name yet. Mark is boring. Maybe Roberto, that sounds like something no one ever would call an armor which makes it likely of Tony do use that particular Brazilian soap opera name.

Ugh. Not Feeling Okay makes his thoughts even weirder than usual, especially with no distractions –

'Tony?' someone calls and Tony vaguely recognizes Bruce's concerned voice, overshadowed by Dummy's familiar chirps.

'Mhm?' he murmurs, patting the bot without opening his eyes because he's pretty sure he couldn't focus them right now, that's not good at all but it'll be remedied with the bot's magical gift.

'You're all pale and clammy, you okay?'

'Dunno,' Tony mutters, attempting to get to the chocolate bar with his trembling hands and damn it's not working, he can't pull the wrapping open and he's pretty sure his blood sugar is scarily low because he hasn't had anything but high-calorie sugary liquid in the suit for fifteen hours.

Someone takes the bar out of his hand, opens the wrapper with a familiar and pleasing sound, and puts it back into Tony's hand.

'That'll help?' Clint asks skeptically too close to Tony's ear for his liking.

'This is the chocolate bar of god, Hawkass – no, Thor, not your kind of gods,' he adds before Thor can ever speak up. Thor hums approvingly so Tony knows he guesses the question right. 'Dummy, be a good boy, share the chocolate with my smelly tired teammates, will you?'

The bots beeps unhappily and moves closer to Tony, pushing the tray he's holding in his claw into Tony's arm. Tony sighs, swallows the blissfully sweet chocolate and opens his eyes only to see his teammates staring at him with various kinds of frowns.

'Dummy will not share anything with your teammates until he is sure you are okay, sir,' JARVIS informs them all pleasantly, with just a hint of a threat in his voice that Tony is pretty sure only he can recognize. Thank heavens – well, thank himself – for his fiercely protective artificial intelligences.

'All right, but we've got to wait for that,' Tony sighs, wrapping his hand around Dummy's arm and squeezing it. 'If you want refreshments, I'm afraid we're not providing them at this after-party,' he says, closing his eyes again to avoid feeling even worse during the spell of dizziness he can feel coming.

'What's wrong, Tony?' Steve asks, speaking up finally, with the serious voice surely accompanied with a serious face that Tony knows too well. 'We're all tired and battered, but –'

'I just need some sugar. And rest. And I need those two to lay off me because I will be fine,' Tony replies, stressing the last word in a way that JARVIS will read as sir is annoyed but he is going to be fine.

'You looked like you were about to faint. Despite sitting down,' Steve continues and this time, Tony guesses he's pinching his nose in confusion.

'Just low blood sugar,' Tony says, rolling his eyes even though no one can see that. 'Nothing some candy can't cure. JARVIS?'

'A few more minutes, sir.'

'Right. I'll have this lovely moron here serve your refreshments in ten minutes when it gets to his wired head that everything's fine – don't look at me like that,' he adds, feeling Natasha's stare.

'You are –'

'Yes, I am, didn't you know that? I thought that S.H.I.E.L.D. file about me would have it in red letters or something, I don't know what color code you use, do you even use a color code? Isn't everything S.H.I.E.L.D. black or that dark depressing grey?'

'Shut up,' she says a little bit more warmly and walks away, her footsteps almost inaudible, and comes back a minute later with a glass of apple juice that Tony keeps in his bar for when he feels like pretending he's drinking alcohol. 'Type one or two?'

'One,' he replies with a sigh and opens his eyes, meeting his teammates' stares again. 'I'm diabetic. It's no secret though I don't exactly advertise it. It's fine, I'm fine, it's all being managed and all I did was not take fourteen hours of multiplying bugs in consideration. Ran out of fuel in the meantime.'

'So – that's why you're always snacking?'

'I had enough time to learn that's the best way not to faint,' Tony tells Clint, pulling his legs up and stroking Dummy's claw fondly. 'I have a flair for dramatics but that's not my favorite way of making people hush-talk about me. And I like my blueberries.'

'I'm sure you do,' Bruce declares taking two steps towards Tony. 'Do you want me to –'

'Get me the glucometer. Top drawer, on your left and no, you can't poke me with a needle –'

'A needle?' Steve asks, sounding confused, and Bruce turns around to explain him what glucometer is and how it works when JARVIS speaks up.

'Miss Potts is asking about you. And the team.'

'Tell her we're fine. And that I'll need more of those green tea Kit Kats, she's going to Japan in a few days, right?'

'Very well, sir, I shall make a note,' JARVIS assures Tony with a hint of amusement to his voice that Tony loves. A lot.

'Gimmie that,' he tells Bruce who hands him the glucometer. Tony ignores the rest of the team, not feeling up to explaining Thor that yes, normal humans' bodies have some reaction after eating pounds of sugary treats.

It's routine, checking blood sugar, piercing his already scarred fingers and waiting for custom made Stark Industries glucometer to buzz and send the numbers to JARVIS rather than display them on the screen. JARVIS adds the result to his database, analyzing it in all possible ways within a second, and then displays them on the nearest screen in a neat arrangement of information.

'I guess I need just a real meal now, who's up to something?'

'I would certainly like to feast,' Thor says, still eying Tony unsurely, maybe because Tony is sucking on his finger since it makes the blood stop flowing sooner.

'So, just in case we need to know –'

'I always have my insulin pen on me. Red and gold, you get the tune… JARVIS can tell you anything if you need info and I can't answer, hell, JARVIS tells me everything. He likes playing an M.D.'

'No pump?'

'This tends to mess pumps up, dunno why, wasn't worth investigating,' Tony says, tapping on the shiny reactor in his chest. 'I made my custom, too, but when it turned out it didn't work I gave it to a kid. He loved it, so you see, I can be a good guy too.'

'I don't doubt that,' Bruce says lightly, moving back to where he was standing at the beginning, and looks around expectantly. 'Food?'

'Yeah, damn right, food,' Clint sighs and then turns around and disappears in the elevator and everyone else follows.

It's just Tony and Natasha holding the other elevator's door open for him.

'Do I get to poke you with a needle sometime?' she asks trying to sound innocent what actually makes her feel more deadly but Tony can just smirk because Dummy is still at his side. If Natasha tries to stick a needle into him again, she'd have to get past Dummy. And JARVIS. So that'd never happen. 'Yes, I know, I used up all my chances for this decade. Century, possibly. But I'm not going to hesitate if you collapse on me.'

'Good to know someone won't freak out,' Tony chuckles, 'I might forgive you one more time,' he teases, standing up slowly; even if his blood sugar is ok now, the dizziness isn't completely gone yet. He murmurs a few words to Dummy, sending the bot back to the workshop with the rest of the sugar bomb, and makes his way into the elevator.

* * *

**A/N: **Thank you for reading an cheers to all diabetics out there! I hope you all enjoyed the little story :)

(This was a gift story for whitchry9 who requested diabetic!Tony, I sometimes randomly write request fic so if you want to try your luck follow my tumblr - the address is in profile!)


End file.
